Real reason stores are opening on Thanksgiving

Turkey Day has become a huge day for retail — online

It used to be the only consumption that took place on Thanksgiving happened around the dinner table. But retailers are changing the game. Target announced Monday that it will open at 8 p.m. on Thanksgiving, Best Buy announced Friday that it will open at 6 p.m., and Kmart
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announced last week that it will open at 6 a.m. on Thanksgiving and not close until 11 p.m. on Black Friday. They’re some of the dozens of other retailers, including Macy’s
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and Walmart
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, that over the past few years have chosen to open on Thanksgiving. The message is clear: Turkey Day is now just another shopping day..

But don’t blame the stores for elbowing in on family time, analysts say: They may be responding to the fact that Thanksgiving is one of the fastest-growing shopping days — online. According to data from comScore, online spending on Thanksgiving Day increased 32% from 2011 to 2012 (and over the past five years has increased 132%). Meanwhile Black Friday online spending increased just 28% over last year and 96% over the past five years and Cyber Monday spending increased 17% over last year and 100% over five years. “Thanksgiving has become a marquee day for online shopping,” says Keith Mercier, associate partner with IBM’s Retail Center of Competence.

To be sure, the total online spend for Thanksgiving Day — $633 million last year — is small compared with the more than $1 billion that was spent on Black Friday online and the nearly $1.5 billion on Cyber Monday last year, according to comScore. Still, Thanksgiving Day sales are a major opportunity for growth.

Which is why they may become one of the fastest-growing shopping days for brick-and-mortar stores too. For their part, stores say the move is to please shoppers. In its press release, Macy’s says the doors will be unlocked “in response to interest from customers who prefer to start their shopping early.” Target said the move to open its doors at 8 p.m. on Thanksgiving gives its shoppers “easier-than ever access to Black Friday doorbuster deals.”

But with online sales numbers on Thanksgiving Day growing rapidly, the stores may have no choice but to open up. Nikoleta Panteva, an analyst at IbisWorld, says it’s likely a way to maximize sales during the holiday season. “By opening their doors earlier, stores play into the mind-set that the good deals will be gone early, thereby creating consumer demand.”

Not only might retailers be chasing online revenues, this year in particular brick-and-mortar retailers are in need of more shopping days — and more customers — which might make the prospect of opening on Thanksgiving even more compelling. That’s because Thanksgiving falls on November 28, which means there are only 26 days between Thanksgiving and Christmas —the bulk of holiday shopping tends to happen between these two dates — compared with 32 last year. That’s the shortest number of prime shopping days in a decade.

Plus, analysts are predicting that stores will get less foot traffic this year due in part to a still-struggling economy and uneasy consumers . Store visits are expected to fall 1.4% in November and December compared with last year, according to research firm ShopperTrak. And this year, for the first time ever, retailers have to contend with the fact that online giant Amazon just announced a deal with the U.S. Postal Service to deliver packages on Sunday.

The move toward opening on Thanksgiving is controversial — many retail workers and their families think it’s unfair to ask them to come in on one of their few days off — and it’s not clear whether it will work in retailers’ favor. Panteva says that though some stores did this last year, “it’s not certain whether this tactic has been helpful in generating higher revenue.” But whether it works for retailers or not, for consumers who have had a little too much family or turkey time, it’s a ready-made excuse to get out of the house. Just don’t expect that you’ll be the only one doing it.

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